


it felt like home with you

by softestlesbian



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Post-Zayn One Direction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-25
Updated: 2016-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-29 02:56:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6356116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestlesbian/pseuds/softestlesbian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis heads out without another word, banging his fist loudly on the door and yelling, “Harry!”</p>
<p>There’s no answer.</p>
<p>“Harry, for fuck’s sake, open the door!” Louis yells again, banging louder this time. The thought strikes him, hot and terrifying, that Harry’s gone too, that he’s decided to fuck off with Zayn, but --</p>
<p>There’s a soft click of a door down the hall and Harry pokes his head out, dressed only in one of Niall’s shirts and a pair of pants. Louis stares at his thighs, doesn’t have anything to blame but himself, not the liquor, not the hour.</p>
<p>“What on earth,” Harry mumbles, rubbing his eyes and walking toward Louis. “Why are you shouting? It’s -- s’the middle of the night,” he says, voice going whiny at the end like it used to (still does).</p>
<p>“Come here,” Louis says, flapping his hands at him. “Get -- here, inside, I need to talk to you.”</p>
<p>*</p>
<p>or: Zayn's gone, and Louis won't let himself lose Harry as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it felt like home with you

**Author's Note:**

> hello i wanted to write a little ficlet and here i am, 3K later, with lots of regretful louis and sad harry. 
> 
> disclaimer: this isn't true!

Two weeks after Zayn leaves, Louis finds himself in Liam’s space. He’s been there since they got the news, it feels like, steadily drinking more and more until he’s on the cusp of forgetting how angry he is.

They’re playing FIFA and Louis is more than a little tipsy, his head in Liam’s lap. His thumbs stutter on the control and he says, sharp and angry, “Fuck him.”

Liam drops a hand to comb through his hair, making a soft  _ tsk _ ing noise to accompany it that Louis knows he picked up from Harry. The thought makes him angrier than it should, sadder than it ought to. It’s been forever, forever and a day, forever with another forever on top of it. 

“He just wanted to be happy,” Liam tells him, voice quiet and measured. 

Louis sits up and shakes him away, trembling a little bit. “Everyone just fucking wants to be happy. Doesn’t mean they’ve got to  _ leave _ me without -- without even a  _ word _ . Jesus.” Everyone. Harry Eleanor Zayn, soon to be followed by Liam and -- Niall, maybe, though Louis doesn’t think he’s ever known anyone as loyal as Niall is.

“Everyone hasn’t left you!” Liam insists, trying to yank him back into a hug. It doesn’t work. Louis shakes him away, standing up and stumbling a little bit. He grabs for his jacket, misses it the first couple of times. 

“I miss him too, you know. It isn’t just you he’s left,” Liam tells him. 

Louis ignores him as hard as he can, trying his damnedest to zip it up. He can’t quite manage it and he decides to leave it as it is, tugging his trackies up and grabbing his phone. 

“Where the fuck are you going?” Liam asks, finally getting up himself and grabbing his arm, tugging him back a little. 

Louis finally pauses. “Look,” he gets out as severely as he can. “No one else is leaving the fucking band. Now let me go, please. Look, you’ve won FIFA. Go brag about it to Niall.” He knows he’s slurring his words, can hear it even himself, but if he doesn’t do it now he doesn’t think he ever will (and, do what, he doesn’t know). 

“Fine,” Liam says, finally letting him go and sitting back down. 

Louis doesn’t look back at him but he does say, “Which room is Harry’s?” very softly, with his hand on the doorknob. 

“He’s two down to the left,” Liam tells him. “Right next to you.”

Jesus. Right next to Louis. He should have known that. He heads out without another word, banging his fist loudly on the door and yelling, “Harry!”

There’s no answer. 

“ _ Harry _ , for fuck’s sake, open the door!” Louis yells again, banging louder this time. The thought strikes him, hot and terrifying, that Harry’s gone too, that he’s decided to fuck off with Zayn, but --

There’s a soft  _ click _ of a door down the hall and Harry pokes his head out, dressed only in one of Niall’s shirts and a pair of pants. Louis stares at his thighs, doesn’t have anything to blame but himself, not the liquor, not the hour. 

“What on earth,” Harry mumbles, rubbing his eyes and walking toward Louis. “Why are you shouting? It’s -- s’the middle of the night,” he says, voice going whiny at the end like it used to (still does). 

“Come here,” Louis says, flapping his hands at him. “Get -- here, inside, I need to talk to you.”

Harry squeezes his eyes shut and heads back into the room he’d just come from.

“Fuck you,” Louis says, wrapping his arms around himself, protective in an attempt to settle himself down. He turns back to Liam’s room, quickly enough that he stumbles a little bit. 

“Hey,” comes Harry’s voice, gentle and pleased. “I was just grabbing my room key.” 

Louis manages to turn himself back around, letting Harry catch him when he stumbles over a little bit. They get inside the room without further incident and Louis makes a space for himself on the bed, curled up as small as he can be and watching Harry with wide eyes. Now that he’s here, he doesn’t know what he wants. He feels more comfortable than he’d thought he would.

“Why were you with Niall?” Louis asks, rolling onto his back and stretching out, pointing his toes. “Were you two shagging?” Harry likes blokes in more than just a theoretical way, and the question -- it hurts to ask but it hurts in the best way, like poking a day-old bruise. 

“Piss off,” Harry says, sitting down next to Louis’s legs and looking back at him. 

They’re too far apart, Louis thinks ludicrously. They should be closer, Harry should be -- over Louis, under him, anything but this distance between them. 

He doesn’t realize how long he’s been staring at him until Harry says, “Lou?” and squeezes his leg, tilting his head. The touch -- it’s been long enough since they’ve casually touched that that Louis jumps a bit -- shocks him into saying the first thing that pops into his head.

“You’re not allowed to leave the band,” Louis tells him, resting a hand on his stomach and looking at him.

The corners of Harry’s mouth tilt downward. “I’m not going to,” he says quietly. “Neither is Liam and neither is --”

“I’m talking about  _ you _ ,” Louis says, and only after he’s said it does he realize he means it, that Harry’s different in this regard as well as all the others. God. “You’re the one who wanted the hiatus, you’re the one talking about going solo --”

“For fun! For -- fuck, a little break,” Harry says. “All I mean is that it’d be nice to… I don’t know. See if I’m any good outside of the band, without you lot backing me up.”

“Of course you are,” Louis snaps. “You’re the best of all of us, you know that.” It’s the kindest thing he’s said to Harry in at least a year; the thought makes him a bit sad and, inexplicably, guilty. 

Harry drops his head forward. It’s dark enough in the room that Louis can’t see his face, but he can imagine the look he’s got on it. It comes easily, and there’s a sense of pride with that. At least he still knows that about Harry. 

“I don’t know that, actually,” Harry tells him, looking at him. “We’re -- all of us are good, s’us together that means we’re fantastic.” 

It hangs between them, the words, and Louis won’t mention Zayn’s name but he knows that’s what they’re both thinking of.

“You’re fantastic,” Louis says after a brief pause. “You could’ve made it, if you wanted. Without us.” There’s an unspoken question, the  _ would you have wanted to? _ that he knows all four of them have been asking themselves lately. 

“I don’t think I could have. Mentally, you know?” Harry says, scooting back on the bed like he’s scared to do it. He looks nervous, actually, nervous like he’s not supposed to be anymore. 

Louis can’t help himself. He tugs him closer with his foot, mumbling, “I want a cuddle.” 

Harry goes very still before he acquiesces, scooting up on the bed until he’s lying next to Louis. “How much have you had?” he asks, barely able to be heard even with how quiet the room is. 

“Few drinks with Liam,” Louis mumbles. “Been… been having a rough time of it.” 

Harry doesn’t say anything in response, just tucks his chin over Louis’s shoulder and keeps himself pressed close. 

“I need you not to leave us,” Louis mumbles, already slipping into sleep even as the words are on their way out. “I need you to not leave me.” 

“I won’t,” Harry mumbles. Louis can hear the way he sucks in a breath, like he’s going to say something else but he doesn’t. 

“Promise?” Louis asks. 

“I’m never the one who leaves,” Harry mumbles into the dark room, arm tightening around him for a second. 

Louis rolls onto his back, blinking fast as though that’ll make it easier to see him, though he still can’t see anything. “You left me,” he tells him. “When I got with -- um.” 

“I didn’t,” Harry tells him. He sounds exhausted, like it’s from more than just the late hour. “I didn’t leave you.”

Louis is too drunk and tired for this conversation. He closes his eyes and lets himself drift off, hand tightly held in Harry’s. 

*

He wakes up, regrettably, alone. His head is pounding and it takes him a few minutes to place why he can’t find any of his clothes. 

Their entire conversation comes back to him and he reaches out for his phone, knocking it onto the floor before he manages to get a grip on it. He types out a text. 

_ To: Harry _

_ Told you you’re always the one who leaves. _

He sends it off and curls up under the sheets again. He’ll give himself another forty-five minutes before he drags himself back to his own room, he insists, burying his face into the pillow that Harry was lying on last night. 

Predictably, he doesn’t get those minutes to himself. Harry comes barging in just a few moments later, phone in hand and looking more irritated than Louis is used to.

“I woke up ages ago, wasn’t going to stay in bed with you so you could laze about for hours and then moan about your head,” he tells him, staying near the door like he’s ready for a fight. 

Louis sits up, pulling the covers close around him. “You still left.” 

Harry pushes out a breath, closing his eyes. “You pushed me away,” he finally says, careful and measured. “You told me you didn’t -- didn’t want to be so close to me. I  _ didn’t leave you _ .” He’s not yelling by the end of it, not even close, but Louis can hear the disdain in his voice and it’s somehow immensely worse. 

He has a thousand defenses on his tongue, about how he was young and dumb and didn’t mean it, didn’t mean any of it, but -- 

“I’m sorry,” he tells him, looking down at his hands, picking at the sheets. 

All is silent for a second. 

“It’s all right,” Harry says when he’s gotten ahold of himself again. “I mean -- I’m not, like. Upset anymore.” 

“But you were?” Louis asks. 

“Of course I was,” Harry says, crossing his arms and leaning against the doorframe. “You fucking abandoned me.” 

“I didn’t mean to,” Louis mumbles, finally looking at him again, not letting himself pull away from it. “It was just -- too much, with the pressure of the fans, with…” He trails off.

“I get it,” Harry says softly. “I get it. Nick’s doing the same thing, he…” He shakes his head. “Feels like when you left, but now I know how to go about it,” he tells him. “Fuck, I shouldn’t be telling you any of this.”

“I want you to tell me,” Louis says quietly. “I want -- like, I want to know what’s on your mind, and --”

“You left me,” Harry says flatly. “You left and Zayn’s gone and now Nick’s leaving as well, and I’ve got -- you, and Niall, and fucking everyone expecting me to leave the band, to find something better, and I’ve never given  _ any  _ of you a reason to think I’d do that.” He’s speaking more quickly now, angrier. “I don’t know how to fix it, either, because every time I try to talk to you I’ve got -- you pulling away, can’t have the fans think we’re fucking, can’t give them any fodder -- and now you’re telling me I’m the one who left and that’s -- it’s bullshit, Louis.” 

“You’ve still got me,” Louis says weakly, crossing his legs so he can sit up a little straighter. “And you’ve still got Nick, just --”

“So long as no one gets wind of it, so long as no one sees us together,” Harry snaps. “God, I get it, I -- I fucking get it, but do you have any idea what it’s like to feel like someone’s dirty little secret when you’re just -- you’ve always just been mates?” 

_ We were more than that _ , Louis thinks desperately, but he knows that’s not true, not true anywhere but in his mind. 

“You’re not a dirty little secret,” Louis insists, and he’s vibrating with energy that he doesn’t know how to place. “I was just -- fucking eighteen and with El and it was easier to -- I don’t know. Let you go than let her go.” 

Harry’s face falls and he looks down. 

Louis feels awful. “I shouldn’t have, though,” he tells him. “You were so, so important to me. I’m sorry, Harry.”

Harry clears his throat and says, “It’s fine,” though his voice is lower than normal, more affected. “It’s fine, I think -- I’m headed to the gym with --”

“You are important to me,” Louis interrupts. “You are, still. You’re my best -- you’re important.” 

“It’s fine,” Harry mumbles. “I get it.” 

“No, fuck, stop. You  _ are _ ,” Louis insists. “Please, just -- just come here, I’m sorry, talk to me, I didn’t mean any of -- anything you thought I meant.”

Harry shifts from foot to foot, looking just as small as he always has. “I’m fine,” Harry says, but Louis can hear the way he’s holding back tears, can hear the way his voice cracks. 

Well. Louis has made more than a bit of a fool of himself today, but there’s no harm in a little more. “I’m not,” he tells him, voice soft. “I miss you so much. Please, just -- just give us a cuddle, yeah?”

Harry walks toward him, sitting on the edge of the bed. 

“Come  _ here _ ,” Louis whispers, voice breaking a little. 

Harry hugs him, hugs him tight, face buried against his shoulder. He holds himself stiffly and Louis lets him, just rubs his back until he can feel him start to relax against him. 

There are things that need to be said, things he needs to admit, but not right now. He’s had enough of this for one week, and it’s enough to have Harry like this, have him here for the day. 

*

He texts him that night, when he’s all alone in his giant hotel room. Usually he’d go to Liam and he considers it, but maybe -- maybe it’s time to start trying. 

_ To: Harry _

_ I miss you _

_ come over?  _

He sets his phone aside and turns on the telly, some black and white film he vaguely recognizes from when he was younger and obsessed with Audrey Hepburn. 

His phone doesn’t go off again, but after a minute there’s a hesitant knock at his door.

“Come in,” he calls, fixing his hair, trying to look less like he’s been impatiently waiting for him. 

Harry walks inside, dressed in his pajamas again, though he looks less nervous tonight (though that may just be Louis’s wishful thinking, he allows). 

“Will you sleep here?” Louis asks, hands resting in his lap. “Please?”

Harry cracks a smile, shaking his head. “You don’t need to apologize anymore,” he tells him, “I’m, like -- I’m over it.”

Selfishly, Louis hopes he isn’t, though he knows just how irrational that is. “I’m not,” he tells him. Want -- want a cuddle from my best boy.” 

It’s something he hasn’t called him in ages and something just gives in Harry in that moment -- it feels like only a second has passed before he’s curled up next to Louis, arm over his stomach again.

“Thank you,” Louis says quietly, turning to brush a kiss over his forehead. 

Harry goes still, but just for a second. 

*

When Louis wakes up the next morning, Harry’s right next to him. 

He’s snoring a little in his sleep, snuffling against Louis’s shoulder. 

Louis takes a second to try to relax before he moves, just to get his arm out from underneath Harry. He’s not gentle enough, though, and Harry stirs after a second, blinking at him.  

“Good morning,” Louis whispers. 

Harry smiles, slow to start. “You’re here,” he mumbles, keeping as close as before. 

“Yeah,” Louis breathes. “You can -- you should start, um. Start sharing with me again,” he tells him. “I like it better when you’re here. Always have.” 

Harry hesitates for a second. 

“I’m not just apologizing for before,” Louis says. “I really -- I miss you. I mean that. I want you back in my life.”

“Then I’m back,” Harry tells him, feeling over his cheek and smiling at him. 

Louis gathers all of the courage he can and leans closer, looking up at him. He barely kisses him, really just brushing their lips together gently enough that Harry could pull away at any minute if he wanted to. 

Harry doesn’t pull away; Harry kisses him back, slow, keeping otherwise completely still like he doesn’t want to spook Louis. 

He lets the kiss come to a natural end before he says anything. “You’re just as good a kisser as everyone says,” he teases, though his voice comes out -- breathless, really.

“Lou,” Harry mumbles, and he sounds exactly like he did back at sixteen, when Louis would push too hard and tease too much. 

Louis can’t deal with all of the feelings coursing through him, but now that he knows he’s allowed to -- he can’t resist kissing him again, getting a hand into his hair and letting a soft gasp out. Every time it feels like Harry’s going to pull back he kisses him again, dragging him into several in a row before he finally has to breathe. 

Harry’s eyes are closed when Louis opens his own and he looks him over, gently resting his fingertips on his cheek. 

“Stay,” he tells him quietly, while Harry still looks soft like this, like he wants to be here. “Please -- stay.”

Harry opens his eyes, and nods. After a pause that feels like forever, he smiles and mumbles, “Yeah. I will.” 


End file.
